Ford Trucks: The New School Bus of Choice?

Iowa is trying to make it legal for schools to transport students via pickup truck. And why wouldn’t they?

You’d be forgiven if you can’t really see the correlation between regular old Ford pickup trucks and school buses. After all, one is designed to haul dozens of kids and has a nifty built-in stop sign. The other has a lot less passenger room, but offers up more in terms of power, towing capacity, and off-road capability. But if a recent proposal in Des Moines, Iowa makes it on the books, Ford trucks and school buses will be one in the same.

Specifically, Senate Study Bill 3186 would allow local school districts to use pickup trucks weighing under 10,000 pounds to transport students. Only to extra-curricular activities, mind you, nobody’s that crazy. They can only haul a maximum of nine students, including the driver. And everyone must be in the truck’s cab, wearing a seat belt. No, not going wild in the bed like we used to do in the good old days.

Seems pretty reasonable for a state famous for its vast acreage of farmland, no? Surprisingly, however, the whole thing came about after a 2006 decision barred Future Farmers of America students from using a school-owned pickup to transport produce. You might be able to drive yourself to school in a pickup truck. But obviously, using it for commercial purposes tied to the school is a no no.